Kids Cooking Thursday: Choc crossless buns

Now, we don't go in for religion much in our household, so we won't be glutting ourselves with Hot Cross Buns and chocolate eggs this weekend. But Hot Cross Buns were part of the Cooks Club Challenge, so I thought we'd have a go. Since we aren't too fond of mixed peel, and the regular HCB, I thought we'd go chocolate. But after looking through a heap of recipes, even one that came with my bread maker, I decided just to modify my standard roll recipe. So here it is, for other lazy type people who can't be bothered with the warm milk/bread improver/whisking and standing type steps in the standard methods.

Chocolate Hot Cross Buns (for the bread maker)
275ml water
500ml bread mix (not bread flour!)
1 1/4 tsp yeast
1 tbsp cinnamon (use dutch, it's vastly superior)
1 tbsp cocoa (likewise!)

1 cup sultanas
1 cup chocolate, cut into chunks (or choc chips)

Put the first five ingredients into the bread maker's pan, in that order. Select "dough" setting on your machine. Wait for the beeps that tell you it's time to add in your add-ins. Add the sultanas and chocolate. Wait for the rising cycle to finish. Form into roll shapes, and place on tray, about 1cm apart. Cover with glad wrap or a tea towel, and let rise again for about 30 mins, or till doubled in size. Bake at 200C for 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the centre of a bun comes out clean. Pipe on crosses with melted cooking chocolate (if desired). Serve warm.

Melty butter goodness!

These came out a little denser than I would have liked, but they didn't get enough rising in, as I got interupted by a woman wanting us to go back to our old phone company in the middle of the process. And they had a definite crunch to the crust. DP says this is normal, and it's been so long I'll have to take his word for it, though I'm pretty sure I'd remember if I'd ever had any like that. But they were gooey, and chocolatey, and ever so tasty, and after a few bites, I forgot I wasn't 100% happy with them. And the kids had a ball, rolling them into balls, and getting their hands filthy (and picking the sultanas and chocolate out of the raw dough and eating it when they thought I wasn't looking!) They didn't double in size after being made into buns, so they didn't touch each other in the oven, and that may have been the problem with the crunch, and the density as well. See?

These were actually more of a brown cocoa induced colour, not this golden

They made a great dessert though, I had two, and they were very filling. I'm looking forward to seeing how these go toasted under the griller tomorrow.